Some 24,000 users across the Home Office and UK Border Agency will be provided with IT services, including desktops, applications hosting, networks and supporting infrastructure and services under the contracts, according to the Home Office.

It also said they were signed under the 'Extend and Blend' project, which is part of the its Next Generation Information, Systems and Technology Transformation programme.

Sirius, signed in 2001, developed the Home Office's email, intranet, extranet and telephone voice services, supporting some 19,000 desktops. It was awarded to a consortium of Fujitsu, PricewaterhouseCoopers and Global Crossing.

Atos Origin's original IT support services contract with the UK Borders Agency was signed in 2004 under a public private partnership initiative.

Helen Kilpatrick, Home Office director general, financial and commercial, said: "The extended contracts are a great achievement, which will help the Home Office improve the service we provide to the public. By working collaboratively with Atos Origin and Fujitsu from the outset, we have been able to re-engineer the existing contracts in record time.

"The result is a completely new approach to IT service provision in the Home Office, reducing costs by a more than a quarter over the lifetime of the contracts."